But what about the way the city looks? And just as important, the way it functions for those who live and work here?

The question is fairly asked after some recent decisions from City Hall. And no, this isn't about Emanuel's controversial call approving the demolition of the late architect Bertrand "Bud" Goldberg's obsolete Prentice Women's Hospital. That was a coin-flip.

My alarm bell got rung by his speedy push-through of the $154 million, 20-year deal to line the city's expressways with enormous glow-in-the-day billboards.

Sure the city needs the money. But at the price of marring the view of Chicago's incomparable skyline as one approaches from the north, west and south? At the price of bathing nearby residential blocks in the blinking, LED glow of 1,200-square-foot mono-pole monsters?

Challenged about aesthetics by Ald. Bob Fioretti, 2nd, one of the few in City Council willing to stick his neck out, Emanuel shot back that, if opponents had a better way to balance the budget — besides higher taxes — he'd be willing to listen.

But where is that logic headed?

Will the city soon be ready to line Lake Shore Drive with billboards if the price is right? And now that we're willing to plaster taxicabs, CTA buses and rapid-transit cars with commercial blather, how about Metra trains? Or more of those billboard trucks that cruise downtown 24/7?

Why, if the city deficit deepens, the marketeers could tether billboard balloons from water cribs in the lake. Or beam soft drink holograms onto our woefully underutilized night sky.

OK, that's over the top.

But don't think this administration — like those before it — doesn't make decisions every week that impact the look and living conditions of the city. Example: Does not that proposed skyscraper complex on Wolf Point — where Jean Baptiste Pointe du Sable set up his trading post more than 200 years ago — seem a bit overscaled, its river-edge treatment a bit underwhelming?

Other decisions soon will require a balancing of profits and taxes against the city's emblematic promise of "Urbs in horto."

Take the mega-casino surely on its way now that the mayor's political allies have won veto-proof majorities in both houses of the state Legislature. Will the new gaming palace tastefully mesh with the fringes of downtown ... or be a garish, parking-surrounded transplant from the Las Vegas strip?

Then there's the impending billboardization of Wrigley Field. And the soon-to-be submitted mixed-use additions to the United Center. Aesthetics never sleep.

Lately it has been all the rage to dump on the legacy of former Mayor Richard M. Daley, with emphasis on his poorly executed lease-away of curbside parking. Fair enough. But for all the smirks and the rolling of eyes they provoked, Daley's street median planters, wrought-iron fences, green roofs and half-million trees show he understood aesthetics are an essential competitive advantage among cities jockeying for the title "global." It's something the young techies at Motorola Mobility and Coyote Logistics think about when deciding where to work and live.

Nobody's better than Emanuel at courting the CEOs of such companies. And the new mayor has shown flashes of inspired urbanism, as when he suggested that Uptown, with its historic but rundown theaters and dance hall, has the makings of a world-class entertainment district.

So go ahead and count your billboard rent, Mr. Mayor, and keep on telling those who object that a little bit of ugly is better than a lot of tax increase. Most folks, including many in the media, will go along with the logic.

But remember that, in the long run, those little bits add up. Before you know it, the larger game is lost.

How's this for a New Year's resolution: Enough with the billboards. Get going on Uptown.